This invention relates to a circuit for driving a gas discharge display panel which may be an external electrode gas discharge display panel known in general as a plasma display panel.
A gas discharge display panel comprises a pair of opposed electrode groups arranged on either side of a gas discharge space means which may either be a continuous space filled with an ionizable gas of a plurality of like spaces, called discharge cells. Layers of an electrically insulating material may be provided on the opposed surfaces of the electrodes as in a plasma display panel. The electrode groups may either be groups of so-called matrix electrodes or a combination of a first group of segmented electrodes and a second group of the opposite electrode or electrodes.
A conventional driving circuit of the type described, includes at least one switching transistor for each of the electrodes of the display panel. The switching transistors must withstand a relatively high voltage, such as 140 volts. Also, a logic circuit has been necessary in order to supply pulses to each switching transistor. It has therefore been unavoidable that the circuit becomes bulky and expensive particularly when the panel to be driven has a great number, such as two hundred or more electrodes in at least one of the electrode groups. With a conventional driving circuit of the type described above, it has been necessary to compromise between the power consumption in the circuit and the speed at which the switching transistors turn off. This compromise has imposed a serious restriction on the progress of the art of plasma display panels and has made it impossible to utilize a so-called time division drive to activate a plasma display panel having segmented electrodes for a large number of digits, such as ten or more digits.